Isotonik Studios has announced the release of a free Max for Live analysis device by Mark Towers that can display audio frequencies of up to 4 tracks in Ableton Live 10. The Multi Analyser device is particularly useful when mixing since it allows you to visually identify and compare problematic/clashing frequencies. What Live 10 adds […]

Finally! Now you don’t have to wait for your computer to start glitching out – you can make it happen yourself, with this inexpensive Max for Live device.

Okay, so technically what we’re talking about is a “stockastic sample freezing effect.” Since it’s a Max for Live Device, you can drop its audio-munching powers on any track you want, making for glitched out percussion, vocals, or whatever you like. But if you’ve ever watched a computer melt down and listened to the resulting sounds and thought, “hey, actually, I could use that” – this is for you.

The reason it matches a BSOD is, computer stability issues cause the digital audio buffer to “freeze” on particular sounds rather than continue to process buffered audio normally. (Digital audio systems give the illusion of running in real time, without losing a continuous stream of audio, by dividing digital audio into chunks and feeding those chunks in sequence to the audio card… so that if the machine falls behind a few samples, you won’t notice.)

This creation is the second Max for Live invention from Isotonik Studios today – happy Valentine’s Day, y’all – and carries the price of €9.52. For that, you get some control over the effect – especially since it isn’t actually crashing your machine. The developers describe the parameters as follows:

Freeze: control the gate frequency in time signatures
Width: make the gating wider or tighter
Dry/Wet: master dry/wet control

And all of this is MIDI-controllable.

If you want to live more dangerously, the classic Smart Electronix effect Buffer Override actually does screw around with your machine. The work of developer Sophia Poirier, this is the opposite of what would normally constitute a stable plug-in. The idea: it “overcomes your host app’s audio processing buffer size and then (unsuccessfully) overrides that new buffer size to be a smaller buffer size.”

Beware, as that will actually cause some hosts to, you know, crash. But Buffer Override is free. (Well, it’d be a bit strange to charge for that!)

The big Max for Live news in Live 10 isn’t actually “integration.” It’s finally having multichannel audio support. Here’s a free tool to get you started.

“Wait, wait… weren’t we supposed to be excited about Max for Live integration in Live 10?” Well, yes… kinda sorta. Basically, if you’ve got Live 10 Suite, you get a single installer, less version confusion, and you don’t see that silly Max splash screen the first time you launch a Device.

That’s all well and good, but it’s not a reason to upgrade to Live 10, or even something you’ll really notice in day to day use.

Now, multichannel support, on the other hand – that’s a big deal. And it’ll be a big deal even if you never touch Max yourself, because suddenly the little Max for Live toys you grab will get a whole lot more interesting.

What Live 10 adds to Max for Live is the ability to route any audio inputs you want into a Device, and to any outputs, including to arbitrary tracks. The implications for that are varied: wild sidechaining, panners, spatial audio, multichannel effects – think basically anything that goes beyond just having stereo inserts and sends from a single track. It’s something that really ought to have been in the first release of Max for Live, but now that it’s there, it opens the floodgates to neat new patches.

That also Live up to some of the original promise of Max for Live, which is finding creative applications beyond what’s covered by the usual plug-ins.

But to get us started, here’s a more utilitarian application – and a cool one.

The fine folks at Isotonik Studios have whipped up a “Multi Analyzer” – a spectral analyzer that lets you compare tracks and view them at once. And that, of course, is actually what you’d want to do with such a tool, when finding mixing issues and the like. (Hey, Ableton – take note. This should be built in.)

You can route in up to four tracks and view their spectrum visually.

Clever stuff, and the price is free. I got it up and running in about a minute with a track I was looking at today, and it’s really handy for mixing.

Now, if you’ve been paying attention, it should go without saying that you’re going to need a copy of Max for Live (that is, Live 10 Suite edition) and Live 10 as a minimum version, since Live 9 doesn’t have this feature.

I’m very interested in the applications of this for Live users. And multichannel diffusion and spatial audio remain interesting, not only in Live but across electronic music. Hopefully more on all of this soon.

Animatek has released version 3.1 of the Ultimate Ztep Zequencer, the creative 16-step sequencer Max for Live device for Ableton Live. The update makes the sequencer compatible with Live 10. The code has been rewritten and optimized to 48%, making it very fast. UZZ 3.1 is a step sequencer created in Max for Live for […]

Plugin Boutique has launched a sale on Streakulator, the MIDI-modulated audio effect by Audiomodern. With the recent version 2 update this Max For Live device by Ernesto Cecco D’Ortona aka StrangeLines comes with new features. STREAKULATOR is literally a swiss army knife for Ableton Live: you can do sidechain, sound design, waveshaping, filtering, wobble and […]

Audiomodern has announced the release of Streakulator V2, an updated version of the MIDI-modulated audio effect for Ableton. Created in collaboration with StrangeLines, this Max for Live device is geared towards sound design for modern producers. Its main job is to create crazy sounds with a human touch in no time: the possibilities are endless. […]

Ableton has announced the release of Ableton 10, the latest version of its music production software for Windows and Mac. Today’s the day! Live 10 is here – with new devices, improved workflows, a redesigned sound library, expanded Push features, Max for Live integrated in Suite, and much more. As previously announced, version 10 comes […]